MessageThe
joyous message of Christmas demands a response from us all year
round.

Sermon

The
word of God comes to us with some contrasting tones of voice tonight.
And I reckon those contrasts and conflicts are not too far beneath
the surface for many of us as the Christmas festivities get into full
swing. Mixed emotions and conflicted feelings swirl around for many
of us at Christmas, and I think that perhaps these readings are
calling us to spend some of our Advent preparation time reflecting on
these things and preparing ourselves for how we will deal with this
this time round.

The
obvious tone is that of celebration. We talk of a “festive season”
and of “celebrating Christmas”. Parties and lavish dinners and
gift giving and carol singing. Celebration is everywhere. And
celebration dominates in all but one of our readings tonight. The
first words we heard from the prophet Zephaniah were “Sing aloud, O
daughter Zion; shout, O Israel! Rejoice and exult with all your
heart, O daughter Jerusalem!”

Rejoice
over what? Well, the prophet continues to lay out the cause for this
celebration: a vision of God coming to save the people, to turn their
fortunes around, humbling their enemies, ending their shame, and
gathering them home in joy and safety and honour. It is a classic
expression of the hopes and yearnings of God’s people in ancient
times. Israel longed for the day when the Messiah would come and
suffering and oppression would be banished forever and all would be
well. And the prophets - Zephaniah among them - urge the people to
celebrate this now. Don’t just yearn for it, but celebrate it now
as a declaration of trust in God’s promise to bring it to
fulfilment.

We
joined in singing the canticle from Isaiah which similarly rejoiced
in this vision of the Messiah who is coming to us. “Surely it is
God who saves us. We will trust in God and not be afraid. For the
Lord is our stronghold and our sure defence, and he will be our
saviour.”

And
as Christmas draws near, it shines a different light on these hopes
for a messiah, a saviour. It mysteriously takes us to a manger, a
humble feed trough in a stable, and invites us to recognise the
fulfilment of all these hopes in a newborn baby laid there. Here is
the longed for messiah. Here is the saviour for whom you have hoped
and prayed. Here is your God made flesh. And in the surprise and
wonder of it all, there is great cause for rejoicing, for
celebrating, for festivity. “Rejoice in the Lord always,” says
the Apostle Paul, “and again I will say, Rejoice.”

And
rejoice we will. And rejoice and be festive others will too. Many
churches will attract far bigger crowds on Christmas Eve and perhaps
Christmas morning than they do at any other time of the year. Many
will gather to sing hymns of praise to the Christ child, and to
joyously declare him to be the long awaited saviour of the world.
Many will feel drawn to add their voices to the praise of Jesus
Christ on that night, even though they have been absent and silent
the rest of the year. And surely we can rejoice over that, and
celebrate the news that the story of Jesus’ birth still evokes
something that draws so many people to bend the knee.

Or
can we? I don’t know about you, but I feel a bit begrudging about
it. I’m not proud of it, but there is a part of me that resents
these people who swan into churches for the Christmas festivities and
then disappear again for another twelve months, trusting that someone
else will do all the work and keep thing ticking along so that there
is something for them to turn up to again for one night next year.

I
recognise this feeling from another context too. You see it among
diehard football fans. There are two sorts of footy fans. There are
those rusted on ones, who are paid up and there in the stands year
after year, through thick and thin, cheering on their team in good
times and in bad. And then there are those who say they support the
team and who keep up with the scores on the telly or in the paper,
but seldom ever go to games. But then, from among them are the ones
who jump on the bandwagon when the team seems to be hitting a period
of real success. When their team sit on top of the ladder and is
being talked of as a genuine premiership contender, suddenly they
take out a membership and turn up to games, wanting to be a part of
it all. And there is an ambivalent mood that can grip the
long-suffering rusted on supporters when these fair-weather
supporters jump on board. On the one hand they know that the club
benefits from the increased membership sales and the extra numbers
through the gates, but on the other hand, it just doesn’t seem
fair. Where were this mob in the tough times when the club needed the
support all the more? How come they get to share in the gain when
they haven’t gone through the pain? So there is a resentment of
their presumed right to join in the party when they haven’t walked
the walk through the ups and downs.

I
sensed something of that ambivalence in the contrasting moods of the
scripture passages tonight. Zephaniah, Isaiah and Paul were full of
rejoicing, but from Luke’s gospel, the cranky voice of John the
Baptiser came growling forth with a very different sound. Who are you
johnny-com-latelies? Who warned you to to flee from the wrath to
come? You think you can rock up here and make your annual nod to the
Almighty and be welcomed to the party with open arms? Arrghhh! Brood
of vipers! Freeloaders! Fair-weather fans jumping on the bandwagon!
Wake up to yourselves and start walking the walk, and we’ll not
take you seriously until you’ve proved yourself over time. And John
spells out in no uncertain terms what it will take to prove yourself.
Share what you have. Don’t abuse your power or influence. Give
freely to those in need. Reckless generosity and love of neighbour.

It
is a radical change of our ways. And the church asks us to hear this
challenge each year in the lead up to Christmas, so that we might
hear that growling voice warn us that bending the knee before the
Christ-child is not to be taken lightly. It’s easy to celebrate the
birth of a gorgeous little baby, but John thunders out his warning
that honouring that baby has implications when he grows up too.
Singing his praises at Christmas demands something of us through the
rest of the year too. About ten years ago, a girl who was a friend of
someone in the congregation came along to our Christmas Eve vigil
service, and during the service I could see her looking as though she
was shrinking back from it, almost physically withdrawing into
herself to avoid engaging with the service. My first thought was that
our style of worship offended her, but when I spoke to her
afterwards, she said she thought it was really amazing, but that she
had never been in a service before where it felt like the words
really mattered and that if you said them you had to be prepared to
change your life and live them. And she wasn’t. She wasn’t
willing to make those kind of changes, so she had to withdraw, to
distance herself from the claim on her life. John the Baptiser would
have been very pleased. That’s just the sort of challenge he hopes
to hammer home. Christmas should confront us all with that kind of
serious demand.

So
I reckon John the Baptiser might side with me in my somewhat
begrudging attitude to those who want to flit into church at
Christmas, enjoy the festivities, and then swan off again. John
might. But I’m not so sure that Jesus would. And maybe the likes of
me need to be wary of assuming our disgruntlements are all justified
and acceptable to God. Because elsewhere, Jesus critiques us for just
such attitudes. In this same gospel, the parable of the prodigal son
is recorded, and in it Jesus exposes the simmering resentment of the
older brother, and challenges us to rejoice over even those who
squandered everything and contributed nothing but now come back in
repentance and seek forgiveness and welcome. And in Matthew’s
gospel Jesus uses the parable of the employer who keeps putting on
more workers and at the end of the day pays them all the same whether
they worked all day or just the last hour. He directs a piercing
light at our precious assumption that we should be honoured and
rewarded above those who jumped on board at the last moment.

A
newborn baby knows nothing of who has worked long and hard and who
has waltzed in at the last moment; who has travelled long miles to be
present here, and who has just popped in from the next room. And so
perhaps Jesus is calling us to accept all comers, and rejoice with
them, and see if any will stay, instead of looking askance at those
who come now who were not here before. And perhaps when John calls
us, if we have two coats, to give one to someone who has none,
perhaps even he could see that that might, among other things, mean
giving half our credit for our long faithfulness to the one who only
now comes in feeling a little naked and unsure whether they belong.
And if we can begin to draw both those strands together — the John
challenge and the Jesus welcome, if you like — and begin responding
to both of them, then perhaps we will truly be preparing ourselves
for a real Christmas worth celebrating.